$5.3 Million Settlement for Woman Needing Multiple Spinal Surgeries After Grease Spill at LAVO Restaurant
Won by Davis Saperstein & Salomon.
A woman who slipped on grease in a common area shared by her employer and LAVO, a nightclub-restaurant then owned by a Madison Square Garden Entertainment subsidiary, suffered neck and back injuries requiring multiple surgeries and settled her case for $5.3 million in 2023.
What happened
In 2014, a woman working at a facility in New York City slipped on grease in a common area shared by her employer and LAVO, a nightclub-restaurant that was then operated by a subsidiary of Madison Square Garden Entertainment Corp. The fall sent her to the floor hard enough to cause serious damage to her neck and spine.
Her injuries were not the kind that heal with rest. She required multiple surgeries on her neck and back over the years that followed, with the procedures and recovery stretching across a long period of time before her case could be resolved. The physical toll was severe and the path to any kind of normal life demanded sustained medical intervention.
Davis, Saperstein and Salomon took on the case, with founding partner Samuel Davis leading the representation. The firm pursued the MSG subsidiary responsible for the common area where the grease had been allowed to accumulate, building a premises liability case centered on the failure to maintain a safe walking surface for people who regularly used the space.
The litigation attracted a separate wave of national attention in December 2022, when Davis, Saperstein and Salomon associate Kelly Conlon tried to attend a Rockettes 'Christmas Spectacular' performance at Radio City Music Hall with her daughter and a Girl Scout troop. Security guards stopped her at the entrance: MSG's facial recognition system had flagged her as an attorney at a firm with active litigation against the company. Conlon was not involved in the LAVO case and does not practice in New York, but MSG's policy banned any attorney from a firm in active litigation, regardless of their personal involvement. She was turned away while her daughter and the other girls were allowed inside. The incident, reported by NBC New York's investigative team, drew widespread criticism of MSG's surveillance practices.
The underlying lawsuit settled in July 2023 for $5.3 million, as reported by the New York Law Journal. The New York Law Journal identified it as a significant personal injury recovery against the former MSG subsidiary. No post-settlement reduction or appeal has been reported.
Sources
This account is drawn from contemporaneous public reporting and the court record.
More proven verdicts from Davis Saperstein & Salomon
All Davis Saperstein & Salomon proven verdicts →Carlos Gomez was burned over 60 percent of his body when an electrical panel exploded while he worked in a Newark office building in 2019. His suit against IDT Corp. and other defendants settled for $28 million, approved by the Essex County Superior Court in February 2023 and ranked by the New Jersey Law Journal as the largest reported New Jersey personal injury settlement of the court's 2022-2023 term.
A 10-year-old girl lost two toes and underwent 22 surgeries after her foot was pulled into a decades-old, poorly maintained Macy's escalator at Garden State Plaza in Paramus; three years later, Macy's and ThyssenKrupp Elevator settled for $15 million.
A Bergen County jury awarded $9.5 million to sisters Gina and Jamie Franzino after a 31-foot Boston Whaler collided with their small skiff in the Manasquan Inlet on Memorial Day weekend 2009, killing a third passenger and leaving both women with severe injuries.
Related slip & fall verdicts
A Cook County jury awarded $32 million to truck driver Stephanie Johnson, who developed Complex Regional Pain Syndrome after slipping on oil at an ExxonMobil facility, in what the Jury Verdict Reporter recorded as the largest CRPS verdict in Illinois history.
After a neurosurgeon slipped on a wet hospital pantry floor and developed reflex sympathetic dystrophy that ended his surgical career, an Evansville jury found St. Mary's Medical Center fully at fault and awarded $16.95 million, a verdict the Indiana Court of Appeals later affirmed.
A Kern County jury awarded William Kidd and his wife Elaine $16.2 million after he slipped at a Bakersfield El Pollo Loco and suffered a brain injury that later required surgery.
A Clark County jury held Lowe's responsible after Kelly Hendrickson slipped on liquid draining from store planters, fractured her skull, and permanently lost her senses of taste and smell.